The first weekend of this season's inter-league play has come and gone in major-league baseball, and again the thing has to be labeled a success, particularly by the bean-counters.

Of the 14 AL-vs.-NL games, six -- Yankees-Mets, Athletics-Giants, Red Sox-Phillies, Angels-Dodgers and Rangers-Astros -- were virtual sellouts. Meanwhile, seven of the other eight affairs drew crowds of 30,000 or more.

Only the Devil Rays-Marlins contest in Tampa failed to move the needle on Sunday, but even that bland match inspired 19,058 to go indoors on a May afternoon in Florida to watch a couple of bad teams play baseball.

I've said it, written it and blogged it to the point of tedium, but here I go again: If the yardstick is fannies in the seats and/or tickets sold, how can anybody argue the immense and ever-growing popularity of baseball in this country?

If, if, if betting was removed from the NFL picture . . . and if, if, if each NFL team played 162 games a season . . . well, does anybody think for a second that the football boys have the kind of product that would draw like the one trotted out by the baseball guys?

The NFL is a spectacle. There is no question about that. And it deserves the huzzahs it has inspired. But it is on display just two days a week for five months; this, while baseball puts out its product every single day for seven months. And still, the Mariners and Padres -- whose combined records were 42-45 -- can draw 37,132 on an afternoon in Seattle. This, as they did on Sunday.

Please. Baseball has to have incredible appeal. How else could it get away with having each of its 30 teams schedule 162 games apiece?

Oh, and let's not even begin to talk about the NBA and NHL, shall we? One-hundred-and-sixty-two pro basketball games each regular season, followed by playoffs? One-hundred-and-sixty-two pro hockey games each regular season, followed by playoffs? I am numb just thinking about it.